Auntie-in-law took us to lunch here, where she knows the owner. Delicious - gan bian si ji do (dry flat green string beans), mu-shu, jo-cai bao (chive dumplings), scallion pancakes. read more

The only sit down chinese spot I will go to. I am picky - and I this place delivers! I even recommeded to one of my instagram followers who were visiting the island and they became Mandarian Maniacs. Love you guys! read more

Major case of food poisoning last night after eating wontun soup. Wouldn't wish that on anyone. First and definitely the last time that I'm eating here. read more

the food here is mediocre in terms of quality of ingredients. not terrible value for the $. I did see a nice big cockroach roaming the environs, which was less than appetizing. Look, I get it - roaches will outlive us all and it is nearly impossible to get rid of them. just try to keep the dining room roach-less with periodic spraying. read more

Strong 4. Looked desolate from the outside but the food was surprisingly good. I got the salt and pepper shrimp and fried string beans which I would get again. Service was great. read more

This smallish restaurant is hosted by kindly and hospitable, if somewhat awkward, servers. The restaurant was tidy and I liked that they had a tv in the corner. I tried the "spicy, garlic pork," which was marked as a house specialty, and was disappointed. It was a little dry, the meat was tough. It wasn't too bad, but not very flavorful. Not a terrible place, but I doubt I'll be back. read more

The ja jang men is good and the sweet sour pork is amazing...oh and they have tsing Tao beer so that's a plus. Great service, plenty of parking..reasonable price. What more can I say. If I crave ja hang men I come here since there's not really many other places that serve it read more

Service was very friendly. Looks like a family owned place that actually puts some love and care into the food they make. The Hot and Spicy pork was good and so was the vegetable fried noodles. It was good but the portion was a little skimpy, I left and I could still eat a lot more. The sides could have came with the main dish but did not. I would check it out. The menu is also huge and a little confusing, I think it should be narrowed down to a few specialties. read more

My dad and I frequent this place quite often. There are a bunch of reasons for this. The first being that the owner/proprietor, Lisa, is an absolute sweetheart. She is really nice and we love carrying conversations with her [and her kids]. Then, there is the food. Oh. My. Goodness. If there is one, sole thing that you have to get when you come here, it is the salt and pepper spare/pork ribs. They are coated in flour/cornstarch, are deep fried to perfection, and topped with schezuan peppers, garlic, and salt. Yum! read more

Nice place for home style northern Chinese good! You will enjoy it's home made noodle, dumplings, and Chinese green onion pancake! The fish dumplings is a must ! read more

I was in for lunch, and had the Char Siu Pork Fried Rice. Great value, good food. No one spoke a lot of English, and they seemed a little scared of me. But they were nice, and it's rare there is enough leftover for me to take home. Overall, I'm pretty happy. read more

This past Friday evening, I dined here with a friend who raved about the joint! She's Chinese, like myself who love good food! I lived in Portland, OREGON where the northern Chinese cuisine is authentically fantastic, and have been searching for good Szechuan and Mandarin food ever since I moved back here 13 years ago to this predominately Cantonese food faring state. I was a bit disappointed. The staff is very welcoming and friendly in this quaint little eatery. But the food...very mediocre. It started off promising with the sizzling rice soup...crispy sizzling hot brown rice cakes in a tasty chicken based broth of mushrooms, water chestnuts and various other ingredients. OK! I'm starting I feel the love! Next up! Steamed basa fish! Yummy! My favorite of the night! Moist, delicately flavored. I'm getting excited except...let's order something a bit more north of the border. We order the Hot and Sour ribs...looks good...tastes...hmmm...how do I explain it...sauce on the ribs bland...meat on the bone... spongy firm texture...not recognizable...hmmm...OMG! I hope it's not...Mittens or Fluffy!!!!! Next up, Oyster mushroom...huge slices of glistening golden mushroom! Unfortunately it was in a sauce that was bitter instead of a savory sauce with some heat. Chewy too! Big disappointment! Last but not least...their 2 starred specialty according to their menu, dry string beans. NOW I know why they call it DRY string beans...shriveled, wrinkled cut string bean in an overpowering oily soy based sauce. Bleaaaack!!! My friend actually commented on the bitter mushroom dish which she had really raved about having here to a male server person who appeared at the end of our meal to ask if we wanted to get the left overs boxed up. All he said was, "Ooooooh??" And stared at us with a deer in the headlight look. All in all, the evening was great, due to the wonderful company of my dinner companion. But, Di...I'm picking the next Chinese joint! LOL read more

Best Ja Jang Mein on the island..the only few left.

The current 4 star rating on this place is definitely misleading. Mandarin Restaurant is a so so kind of a place. Some of the food is good, but most of it wont impress you though it probably wont get to the point of being offensive. For what it is, it is also on the pricey side. read more

Very authentic Chinese food. Boss lady is super nice. The dumplings do have Shandongnese taste! I love here!

Really sub par Chinese food is served here. Bland atmosphere and slow in attentive service. My water was filled once when I came in and once as I was about to pay my bill (and the place was less than 1/4 full). My food tasted like it came from a cheap food court Chinese vendor. The chicken pieces were small, stringy, and tasted frozen, not freshly fried. Fried rice was blah. This place has a "They Love Us on Yelp" sticker on the window, but don't be deceived. Their Yelp reviews aren't good and this place blows. I also think my food was loaded with MSG, because I feel sleepy and groggy now. Additionally, they don't have a lunch or dinner plate, instead they have different prices for the same meals at lunch and dinner. They also don't give you menus here. The menus are plastered to the table. So much for ambience. read more

Torn about this restaurant. I've been to a couple of different places on Oahu that have this style or northern Chinese/Korean food and asked just about every Korean person I've met where to get some decent ja-jjang-myun or cham-pong and I finally stumbled upon this place. While the flavors and style of preparation is what I'm used to from all those spots in LA and the San Fernando Valley that I ate at in my youth, overall quality is pretty meh. The noodles themselves aren't bad at all, got good texture and chewiness, but really the other ingredients that go into either the cha-jjang or cham-pong are really low quality. About every other time I eat the cha-jjang there's a slightly funky taste to it I can't put my finger on. The champ-pong has those disappointingly small, frozen-in-a-bag-you-buy-from-safeway shrimp in them and little else in the way of seafood. So, I guess what I'm saying is that this place is better than the alternatives but still not a real quality restaurant, if you've grown up with this style of Chinese/Korean food in your youth. On the Honolulu scale, this place is a 4 and a half (the other places I've tried so far are just plain old bad). On the LA scale this place is a "I'll eat lunch there occasionally if its on the same block as where I work" 2 and a half stars. read more

The staff was really nice and helpful with the menu. All the food tasted really fresh. If you like eggplant their eggplant tofu was really good! Also I would suggested their honey walnut prawns. I'll be going back again! read more

I was very disappointed with the Twice Cooked Pork. I have never had bacon as the twice cooked pork and I've been eating this dish for over 20 years. Service was prompt and the restaurant was clean. However, I won't be visiting again. read more

Every time I order orange chicken - I can tell it's made fresh. Oh so ono! My favorite Chinese restaurant.

I should have read the previous review about the owner offering refund if the food was bad. I tried this place a handful times. First time, we thought we never go back there. It was just horrible. Too salty, tasteless Chinese food. Then I went back again for lunch for the Shrimp with black bean sauce and it was ok. Had it a few more times for lunch. Then I went back a few night ago. I ordered the same thing and had to throw away most of it. It was TOOOOOOO salty and not edible at all. The cook has no clue cooking the food. If I knew, I would have gone back for refund. Then, I get Chinese food cravings sometimes and thought about ordering something else from here. On the second though, I am too scared to order from here. read more

This is just not your ordinary Chinese food restaurant. There Chinese food is different due to the fact that it's cooked with the flavor from up north of China. I didn't know there was different type of Chinese food until I came here. There hot and sour soup is something to die for. So yummy and delicious! Let's not even start on there spring rolls, Kung pao chicken, Mongolian beef, orange chicken, jajang myun noodles, and there sweet and sour pork. Oh man so good and everything is reasonable. I enjoy it every week with my brother at least once a week!! read more

Should've listened to the reviews. Worst kuang poa chicken I've ever had. Hands down. Never again.

The jja jang myun (Black Noodles) is great. But I would come a hundred times for the Fried dumpling - very traditional Beijing Style. Crispy outside, juicy and delicious meat inside, so good! Very difficult for the chef to make. For this quality, you have to go to mainland China, find a 4 star typical northern style restaurant with chefs specialized in dumplings (there are more than 30 types of filling in Chinese dumplings). Dumplings of this quality can hardly be found anywhere else overseas (you may find similar taste in large cities like L.A, but not with this delicate look), not mentioned Hawaii - a small city. Looks like the restaurant has changed owner. However, the chef is great. My husband and I just found that there is a large car-park at the back so we do not have to depend on the off-street parking spots on the front of the restaurant. We'll come again and again and again... read more

Our favorite reliable inexpensive yummy Chinese-ish restaurant in town. Garlic prawns to die for, scallion pancakes wonderful, sizzling rice soup perfect. Owner is SO nice and genuinely happy to see and serve customers. read more

We had dinner there last night and the service was impeccable, and the food ono-licious. Try the crispy fried ribs! The dumplings are amazing and fresh. Loved the garlic eggplant with pork. If you like bittermelon, you must try their version! There was no corkage fee for the wine we brought, and they provided us with little wine glasses. Good enough. Will definitely go back again. Hope they can stay the course and be profitable enough to last. read more

although this is a northern chinese restaurant, we came here for the korean-chinese hybrid food: ja jang myun (black bean noodles), champong (spicy seafood ramen) and tansooyeok (sweet sour pork) - it was horrible-by far the worst i've ever eaten. the noodles were soft and mushy - definitely over cooked --maybe because it took over 45 minutes for us to get our food. the champong lacked flavor it wasn't spicy at all. it hardly had any seafood in it and they use those really tiny cheap shrimps. the rest of the family had the ja jang myun, and though i didn't try it, they all didn't like it. on top of that, the service was EXTREMELY slow. the tansooyeok was the only thing that tasted OK, but the portion size was extremely smal considering the price. definitely not coming back here again. maybe their chinese food tastes better, but next time we're going to on dong on king street for ja jang myun, even if we have to wait for a table. read more